B for Branding

Having identified what a brand is in a previous post, we are now ready to highlight what makes our offer different to, and more desirable than, anyone else’s, which is what branding is all about.

We need to, with effective branding elevate our product/company from being just one commodity amongst many identical commodities, to become something with a unique character and promise.

We need to create an emotional resonance in the minds of consumers who choose products and services using both emotional and pragmatic judgements. “The art of marketing is the art of brand building.

If you are not a brand, you are a commodity. Then price is everything and the low-cost producer is the only winner.” (Philip Kotler, Kellogs).

What does it all mean ? Well, I am not entirely sure …

This post was going to be all about branding strategies, facts and know-how but in the end, I decided not to write about that because, to be honest, I find it all a bit dull and stressful.

Instead, I will just go ahead and tell you what I would like to achieve with the Jake and Maya brand.

Let me know what you think.

What do we want to achieve ?

We want to design, make and sell sustainable products that you and your family will love and cherish. Each product will be so well-made that it can be passed through family to family, through generation to generation. We do NOT want to create more waste. We want our products to mean something to the our customers so they would want to keep them forever, instead of disposing of them in our ever-growing landfills.

What is our goal ?

Every single product we sell will be of great design, fantastic quality and ethically produced using sustainable materials. We want to show people that family life can be stylish, creative and sustainable, all at the same time. It won’t be cheap (as in fast/disposable fashion cheap) but everything will be priced as low as possible, so at least everyone involved gets paid a fair salary for their work.

What sets us apart from our competitors ?

Jake and Maya is NOT competitive. We believe in helping others. We believe there is space for everyone to thrive. We live and we learn and we are totally honest about what we do and how we do it.

We share all our experiences, successes and failures with whomever wants to be part of our journey. There are no hidden agendas.

Firstly, because they love our work. They love the design of our work and they love the long-lasting quality of our work. Then because they love us and they love our ethos.

Finally, Who is our target customer ?

Our target customer is someone like me. A design-led individual that believes it is our responsibility to help and nurture our planet, the people on our planet and the future of our next generation. Someone that cares about where our products are coming from, how they are made and by whom they were made. Someone that occasionally stops before buying yet another product that they may or may not need.

So, how do we now put these points across to our target audience loud and clear so that they understand what we are all about ? Well, through actions I guess … in our products and in our communication.

As we are still working on our products to be launched, blogging is a pretty good place to start. Don’t you think ?

If you want to find out what we are up to on a daily basis, please follow us on Instagram, where I share random inspiration, pictures of family-life, holidays and work-in-progress.

Note: We are not perfect, nor are we aiming to be perfect. We are trying to do our best. We are trying to do our best in producing the best products for our customers and we are also trying our best to inspire people around us to be just a bit more mindful of the way they live. That’s all.